A ?kodA year in review - Skoda Auto

InterviewŠKODA Board of Management member for Human Resources Bohdan Wojnar“Employees are ambassadorsof our brand abroad”Highly-motivated, well-educated employees with the ability to work anywhere are thebackbone of the ŠKODA growth strategy. At the same time, growth and internationalisationpresent special challenges for personnel planning and development.Mr Wojnar, where do you see the focusof personnel development at ŠKODA AUTOin the future?Our Company’s increasing international orientationrequires appropriate vocationaland professional training for employees andmeans that we have to step up our effortsto recruit globally-minded ‘local talent’ at ourvarious locations.For precisely that reason: New impressionsand challenges are always a valuable personalexperience – something no one cantake away from you. That can be extremelybeneficial for young people later in theircareer. And, remember, our employees aren’tleft to fend for themselves while they areabroad – we give them all the support theycould possibly need.What have you done so far?We are especially proud of the dynamicgrowth of our programme for employeesabroad that we launched several years ago.We have been able to double the number ofemployees working abroad. 2012 we reachedthe mark of 200 employees working in othercountries – more than ever have been employedbefore.Where do these Foreign Service Employeeswork?For example in Russia, China and India. Butwe also have FSEs working in Germany, Polandand Slovakia. And, of course, we haveforeign employees coming to work for usin the Czech Republic, too. This kind ofexchange benefits our corporate culturetremendously.What special qualifications does a ForeignService Employee need?Employees who work abroad for ŠKODAAUTO need good social skills and they needto be especially open-minded when it comesto dealing with other cultures – in additionto the relevant job-specific know-how. Theability to work in a team, assertiveness,self-assurance and a high degree of adaptabilityare all important factors – not to mentioninitiative and a strong commitment tothe task at hand and loyalty to our Company.The job of an employee abroad isn’t alwayseasy – living far from home, facing newand unfamiliar challenges every day. Whyis working abroad still such an attractiveprospect?What kind of support exactly?We set up a ‘Partner Support Programme’, forexample, to help with the delegate’s familyand personal needs. All of our FSEs are guaranteedreintegration and an appropriate jobwhen they return to their home base. Wehandle healthcare and many other aspects.We do a lot to prepare our employees fortheir work abroad – and we have a wholerange of support measures for their timeabroad and after.Where does the FSE programme go fromhere?ŠKODA AUTO has a clear strategy that callsfor continued growth in international marketsover the coming years. This will makethe FSE programme even more important.We want our employees to be ambassadorsfor the brand abroad. Enabling them is a vitalobligation for us, and we will continue tochannel all our expertise into this task inthe future.34 2012 – A Škoda year in review